I consented to this arrangement, and by dint of practising on Timothy
over and over again, I became quite perfect. I should here observe, that
my anxiety relative to my birth increased every day, and that in one of
the books lent me by Mr Cophagus, there was a dissertation upon the
human frame, sympathies, antipathies, and also on those features and
peculiarities most likely to descend from one generation to another. It
was there asserted, that the _nose_ was the facial feature most likely
to be transmitted from father to son. As I before have mentioned, my
nose was rather aquiline; and after I had read this book, it was
surprising with what eagerness I examined the faces of those whom I met;
and if I saw a nose upon any man's face, at all resembling my own, I
immediately would wonder and surmise whether that person could be my
father. The constant dwelling upon the subject at last created a species
of monomania, and a hundred times a day I would mutter to myself, _"Who
is my father?"_ indeed, the very bells, when they rung a peal, seemed,
as in the case of Whittington, to chime the question, and at last I
talked so much on the subject to Timothy, who was my _Fidus Achates,_
and bosom friend, that I really believe, partial as he was to me, he
wished my father at the devil.

Our shop was well appointed with all that glare and glitter with which
we decorate the "_house of call_" of disease and death. Being situated
in such a thoroughfare, passengers would stop to look in, and
ragged-vested, and in other garments still more ragged, little boys
would stand to stare at the variety of colours, and the 'pottecary
gentleman, your humble servant, who presided over so many
labelled-in-gold phalanxes which decorated the sides of the shop.

Among those who always stopped and gazed as she passed by, which was
generally three or four times a day, was a well-dressed female,